[Darris McNeely] There are some problems that come to us in life that linger on and on. They just don't go away. It might be a trial of economics or a family trial, very often it's a health trial a chronic illness that comes upon us, debilitating, long-lasting, and we have to learn to live with it. We learn to manage it and sometimes we get a bit of a respite of a change in that, the problem goes into remission or the disease is actually cured or healed. We do what we can, we pray to God and we seek proper attention to our needs but it represents something that we have to live with. And yet sometimes it just doesn't go away.

And there's a Scripture that I've often thought as I've looked at friends and people who go month to month, year to year with certain problems and learn how to manage that. It's in Psalm 31. It says, "I will be glad and rejoice in your mercy, for you have considered my trouble, you have known my soul and adversities and have not shut me up into the hand of the enemy. You have set my feet in a wide place." It's that "wide place" that we need to think about.

You know, a hiker along a trail in the mountains might come to a point where after hours of walking and hiking they come to a wide spot on the road and they sit down to rest. Life is like that. And sometimes with the diseases, the chronic illnesses that we deal with and we have to work through in life, God gives us a wide place, just as the Psalm says. "You set my feet in a wide place."

When that happens to us, and God can give that to us, that's when we learn to manage. That's when we get a breather and we reflect on God. We are able to kind of step halfway back and get another perspective on life, take a deep breath. I've known friends who deal with chronic illnesses for a long period of time and they get those wide places. Recognize those places. Take them. Take advantage of them. Recognize that very often they do come from God and allow them to help you get a deeper perspective upon God's promises, God's hope, and God's blessings. And that His hand is in your life, He is guiding you so that when you get back up, start walking that trail, that difficult trail once again, you know that your life and your hands are in God's hands and His life.

That's "BT Daily." Join us next time.